Sage have advised Business Partners that Microsoft have announced that as of 9th December 2015, they’ll be removing some of their earlier versions of their REST API, some of which Sage are using to access storage accounts (i.e. blob storage).

Sage have updated Sage 200 2015 to use the latest version and have also included the change within Sage 200 2013 R2 Service Pack 2.

They will not be applying this fix to any other versions of Sage 200 Extra Online, so customers operating any of the versions of Sage 200 Extra Online shown below must be upgraded to Sage 200 2013 R2 SP2 or Sage 200 2015.

Sage 200 2013

Sage 200 2013 SP1

Sage 200 2013 R2

The change is currently planned by Microsoft on 9th December and Sage 200 Online sites must be upgraded no later than 4th December.

Yesterday finally saw the release of the much-anticipated Service Pack 2 for Sage 200 Extra 2015.

One of the key items as part of this is the support of Windows 10 operating system.

There are lots of fixes and some additions as detailed in this document released with the update –

Reports

There are some New Reports to be aware of which are not installed automatically as well as Layout updates too. Check these out with your BP. The introduction of the SOP Profitability reports which include Returns and Credit Notes will be music to some people’s ears, although if you needed this previously you have probably had the report written already.

There also some nice Stock reports, offering different views of Sales by Customer, Product Group and Monthly Sales etc.

Summary Screens

My particular favourite addition in this service pack is the added drill down functionality to the Summary screens. Previously a great visual aid (and Sage Sales Persons dream!) they were not altogether complete from a ‘day to day’ point of view. However we are now able to drill all the way down to the transactional items which makes them much more beneficial as an analysis tool.

Sales Summary Outstanding Debt (Totals)

Sales Summary Outstanding Debt (Drill down to Customers)

Sales Summary Outstanding Debt (Drill down to Transactions)

Installation

Service Pack 2 can be applied to sites running either the Base version of Sage 200 Extra 2015 (all SP1 updates are included) or sites with Sage 200 Extra 2015 Service Pack 1.

As with Service Pack 1 there are two installation files:

Sage200v2015SP2ClientPrerequisites.exe

Sage200v2015SP2.msp

On client machines, both files must be run in the order listed above.

Sage200v2015SP2ClientPrerequisites.exe checks the client files to ensure the correct registry keys are present on the machine.

Sage 200v2015SP2.msp updates Sage 200 Extra.

NB. On a server, you only need to install the Sage 200v2015SP2.msp file.

I have hit this issue on my last couple of installations where the Core components fail to install when accessing Sage 200 2015 System Administrator. Sage have identified this as being an issue which relates to virtual environments (which both of my examples were).

When you access System Administration for the first time after install, various messages appear throughout the initialisation, including those referring to the core components and the building of models. You may notice the system freeze during this.

The issue relates to the available resource on the machine. Clearly the virtual environment must meet the minimum System Requirements for Sage 200 2015. For standard single-server environments, this requires at least a dual-core processor and 4GB of RAM.

Interestingly for my examples the servers should have been fine, however the memory was set to be Dynamically allocated and for some reason was remaining below 4GB. Once this was changed to a Static amount, well above the minimum, the core components installed correctly.

After upgrading a Sage 200 site to Sage 200 2015, an error message may be displayed when accessing System Administration for the first time. The message advises of an error in XML document (9, 3).

This is caused by not removing any Add-Ons before commencing the upgrade to Sage 200 2015.

Previously, the Add-Ons could be uninstalled in System Administration but when you try to remove the Add-Ons , the below error is displayed.

This is because in Sage 200 2015, the schema version number has changed so the Add-On trying to be removed does not have the expected schema number assigned to it and so can’t be removed.

In order to complete the upgrade:

Note: You must take a backup of the Sage 200 Configuration Database before proceeding.

Close any errors and select the Add-Ons option in the left pane.

Make a note of the name of each Add-On installed on the site.

Backup the Sage 200 Configuration Database before proceeding.

Open the configuration database in Microsoft SQL Management Studio and open the tblAddon table.

Look for the Add-Ons that were noted in Step 2 in this table. For each add-on, make a note of the AddOnID in the first column.

Remove the entries from the table for each of these add-ons. This should leave only the standard Sage 200 entries in the table, for example, Sage 200 Accounts, Sage 200 Bill of Materials, Sage 200 Accounts Compiled Model.

Business Partners should note the different method of installation on Clients.

This service pack contains two files:

Sage200v2015SP1ClientPrerequisites.exe

Sage200v2015SP1.msp

On a client PC both files must be run, in that order, to ensure the service pack installs correctly.

Sage200v2015SP1ClientPrerequisites.exe checks the client files and ensures that the correct registry keys are present on the client machines. Sage 200v2015SP1.msp updates Sage 200 Extra. Failure to run the files in this order will cause errors when you try to run Sage 200 Extra 2015.

When importing nominal ledger budgets, a ‘success’ message was displayed but the details were not imported.

6429

The Default Cost Centre drop-down list was not displayed on the Consolidation tab of the Nominal Ledger settings.

Desktop

6389

An ‘Unhandled Exception’ error message appears when trying to add a new feature in Menu Design mode.

6390

Updated the Workspace quick filters to display part searches. Previously, the filter would only search on the entire word (for example, typing AB would only find a customer with the name AB, it wouldn’t find Abbey etc).

6400

User preferences not retained when a user logs out of Sage 200.

6424

Adding reports to the Home Page Favourites now makes the report appear in the Summary screen.

6425

Creating a new folder in Home Page Favourites and adding the report generates an error.

6443

Error in Workspaces where the ‘OR’ filter did not work correctly. In previous versions the OR filter was working like an AND. As a result, no details were being returned by the filter.

In the core Project Accounting module it is possible to create project Statuses and specify whether costs can be entered for a status.

When entering Timesheets in the standard system you are not able to select a project with a status that does not allow costs (as you would expect). However if entering timesheets via WTE, you are able to select a project even if it has a status that does not allow costs.

This was reported in 2011 SP5 originally, and is still not fixed within 2015.

Below is a list provided by Sage of the fixes included within Sage 200 2015.

System Administrator

5997 & 5998

We have improved the speed of the company database upgrade process.
This affects any database that:

uses Analysis codes

has large numbers of SOP, POP or Stock records, or

has large numbers of BOMs or BOM Lines.

6054

Users were unable to create the MMSUser account on Windows 2012 Essentials when it was integrated with Office 365.
Previously the user would see the error message:‘Cannot add login name_mmsuser to server password validation failed, the password does not meet the requirement of the password filter dll’.

Core 200

Nominal Ledger

1392

Tax type and tax code fields were not displayed on nominal journal templates.Previously, a user would have to set up the template and then enter these details once the template had been recalled prior to processing.

Stock Control

5093

Under certain circumstances, Amend Stock Item Product Group stopped working if outstanding works orders existed.
In some cases, an ‘out of memory’ error appeared.

5424

Removing large amounts of stock history records caused on ‘out of memory’ error.

Project Accounting

5476

Users saw the error message; ‘Failed to run SQL script SchemaMigration’ when accessing Project Accounting settings, using the View Project Accounting Settings screen or when saving a project.

5945

Bills were not generated as part of the Suggested Billing functionality. This issue affected some project item types of ‘stock item’, depending on how the item was set to allow costs and revenue.

Period End

5532

Users saw an exception error when trying to drill-down on a value on the Current Periods Totals screen within the VAT Analysis option.
This occurred for users who had previously migrated data from Sage 50 Accounts.

Purchase Order Processing

5541

In some circumstances, a unique reference number (URN) was used if a free text line was analysed to a project. This resulted in a URN that had no postings in the Nominal Ledger.

6053

Saving a record with a long description on the Confirm Goods Received screen generated a ‘Sage Data Access Error – Cannot set the value of the field’ error.

Sales Order Processing

6066

Users trying to print a quotation for quotations that had been entered via the CRM Form Launcher would see an error message ‘Value does not fall within the expected range’.

6239

Customers, using traceability, received an ‘Out of Memory’ error when processing large amounts of stock after the stock levels had been adjusted.

Sales Ledger

5666

Users saw Out of Memory errors or No Network Connection errors when performing consecutive transaction enquiries.

Nominal Ledger

5924

The details of a held journal were lost when creating another held journal from a template.

Bill of Materials

5767

Overtyping the stock code on Record Built Items could move a quantity into stock for an incorrect item.

5780

Users sometimes received an exception error in the following scenario:
Creating a purchase order within Trial Kitting when the supplier had exceeded their credit limit.

5904

The Reverse (BOM) Build process took a specific quantity of a finished item out of stock and added the stock back in to the components.

Manufacturing

Works Order Processing

4551

Traceable Enquiry functionality did not work after changing the product group on a stock item.

6122

Cost of sales postings were incorrect when components were issued to a works order which was completed before the components were invoiced.

6188

Traceable components were not discarded correctly if the build was cancelled on the Confirm batch/Serial Numbers for Components form.

Estimating

5393

Components held against operations were not converted when estimates were converted to a BOM.

Bill of Materials

6086

Cancelling a BOM build for batch/serial items did not allow any changes to the build, unless the screen was closed and reopened.

6096

The Build Session created a reserved temporary batch/serial number in BOM and an error message appeared, preventing the user from entering a value in the Quantity field.

6172

Cost of sales adjustment postings were sometimes posted to the wrong nominal ledger account when building through sub-assemblies.

Other

Process Maps

5564

Enquiry buttons within process maps were not working.

Workspaces

5601

An exception error occurred if the user opened multiple workspaces. We have reduced the amount of system memory required to open multiple workspaces.

Excel Integration

6004

Refreshing data within Excel Integration was not good. We have made performance improvements in this area.

Its been billed as the most important update in years and I have to say, I do not think users will be disappointed. Here are some details of the new features within Sage 200 2015 which was officially released at the end of February.

Look and FeelWhilst the basis is familiar to current Sage 200 users, the screens and menus have changed in appearance giving a more modern design. Many of the changes are designed to make it easier for users to navigate Sage 200 and find/access what they want.

Homepage

List View

Redesigned Process Maps

The 2015 design is much more intuitive. A really nice feature is the frequently accessed page where the system remembers the functions you have used the most, so there is a quick way of getting back to them. What’s even more impressive is it remembers by day. So if you access something on a Friday, the next Friday it will be in your recently accessed.

Frequently used

It is now possible to use a search function on the menu allowing you to search for a menu item and the menu is filtered by items containing the word searched.

Menu Search

Custom colour settings can be applied and you are able to make each dataset/company you work in a different colour to make it more obvious which one you are working in.

Homepage and Favourites still exist whilst being more easily managed. Favourites can be added with one click, and can be arranged in folders, easily renamed and re-ordered.

Fixed Assets
After years without one a simple Fixed Asset register is now included within the Financials modules for Sage 200. This is a welcomed introduction allowing you to set up, depreciate, dispose and delete assets.

Excel Reporting
Excel Reporting gives you more choice over how you can produce the reports you want. The important thing to note here, and I am not sure how I feel about it, is that some Excel reports are provided free while others are available if you subscribe to Excel Reporting. You are able to preview reports within the program to see what you would get in subscription packages.

Excel reports

Summery Screens
New Graphical Workspaces give a great visual representation of certain KPI’s. The Graphs also allow a drill down function to gain more specific answers.

Other Improvements/changes

TheLogon speedhas significantly increased and you will struggle to find time to make a coffee before it has opened. Joking aside this is a major improvement.

There is a completely new ‘list view’that does away with the older-style list views of the previous Sage 200 versions. These new list views include improved searching and filtering methods, and mixes the function of workspaces with the easier to read layout of the old list view.

List views can be opened up in a separate form/window. With a scroll bar!

Totals have been added to quickly show the cumulative values of selected records.

Workspaces also run more quickly, and also make better use of screen space.

Enquiry Screens have returned (I know they could be added to the menu manually in 2013) so the normal forms can be accessed of the menus as per 2011.

Project Accountingnow includes the much requested Work in Progress (WIP) function which accrues for part-delivered project work. This is automatically posted to and reversed from the balance sheet as projects complete. This means costs can be posted to the same period as revenue to ensure true project profitability is shown in financial reports.

Increased narrative length

Ability to edit manual nominal journalsso that you can amend references or narrative.

Functionality to properly account for the VAT legislationchanges for early settlement discount. If you deal with a lot of settlement discounts you must upgrade for this alone.

Support for SQL 2014 is now included.

Ideas Hub this gives an easier route to offering Sage ideas of what changes you would like to see. It also gives you the opportunity to join a Sage 200 community, and hopefully this will offer an increased source of information and communication for users of Sage 200 (hopefully not turning people away from Talking Sage 200!!!!).

I am nothing but positive about Sage 200 2015. A number of the key issues have been rectified and it is definitely the most updated and improved release since the move to a SQL database.